Sony Interactive Entertainment has filed a lawsuit against Tencent over its upcoming game Light of Motiram, with Sony saying it is a “slavish clone” of the Horizon series.
Sony Interactive Entertainment has filed a lawsuit against Tencent over its upcoming game Light of Motiram, with Sony saying it is a “slavish clone” of the Horizon series.
This seems very relevant to the lawsuit.
What did they do, decide to develop a Horizon game in-house, then ask for permission retroactively, and then release it anyway when Sony didn’t agree?
Doom started out as an Aliens game. Though they pivoted away from that to retain more creative freedom.
Starcraft is Warhammer 40k. Terrans are space marines. Protoss are Eldar. Zerg are Tyranids. Been happening a long time now
There is also evidence that an out of court settlement happened between those companies. Notably moving away from cerebrates in SC2.
Not as relevant as you would think, and actually somewhat common in the industry; Warcraft (the RTS) was developed ahead of asking for a license for the Warhammer franchise. When that deal fell through, it was rejigged to be its own thing and published.
I think the key here is that it’s completely identical. It’s virtually the same product if you told me it was another game set in the same universe I would have believed you.
When you rejig something you have to change it enough that it’s distinct, I’m not convinced they changed literally anything.
Would not be the first time, although usually developers then go out of their way to make things more legally distinct.
Off the top of my head, the PS1 game Croc was reportedly originally pitched to Nintendo as a 3D platformer starring Yoshi (it was made by some of the team behind StarFox). They obviously reworked it a ton before it released as what it ended up as.
That sounds like exactly what they did